Fog

Yesterday, late afternoon, we went for a bike ride, 'the Stanford Loop,' up Alpine Drive, around Portola Valley and back home down Sandhill Road. It's about 25 km, and we set out at 6 pm because it would have been too hot earlier. But a great blanket (more like a duvet) of fog was sitting on the top of the range of mountains between us and the coast, and by the time we got to Portola Valley (it takes me quite a bit longer than my husband to climb the Alpine hill) the sun had disappeared, the wind was blowing and the fog was spreading the way it tends to do in the Bay Area. Little cat feet? No, I wouldn't say so--more like big lion paws--still it is uncanny the way it rolls down the hills, first seeping into valleys (or in San Francisco, under the Golden Gate to the Bay, then rolling down the Bay to St Jose), then spreading over the flat lands. There were stars and a new moon (holding the old one in its arms) last night when I went to bed; this morning we too were in the fog, which hasn't yet completely lifted.